Pedersen Wins Thrilling Summerset GT Opener at Hampton Downs – Exton Chased to GT4 Win by Supra Duo

Paul Pedersen has taken victory in the opening race of the Summerset GT New Zealand Championship at Hampton Downs today aboard his Mercedes AMG GT2. In the GT4 class, William Exton claimed his fourth victory of the season in his McLaren Artura GT4.

After the 30-minutes of racing, it was the Mercedes AMG GT2 of Pedersen across the line in first, with Marco Giltrap in his Porsche 992 GT3 Cup Car (Junior Pro) second, with Joel Giddy in his AMG GT2 third.

In GT4, it was Exton in the lead, followed by the Toyota Supra’s of Kaleb Ngatoa in second with Mark Mallard in third.

From the start, the two AMG’s of Pedersen and Giddy managed to slip by pole sitter Marco Giltrap, and were followed by Rick Armstrong who was fourth.

Further back in GT4 Exton retained his lead from Ngatoa.

There was an awkward tangle between the Porsche GT4 runners of Zoe Woods and Tony Quinn. Woods pitting to repair a puncture, the Quinn car retiring from the race.

Back at the front on Lap 8, there was a change of position for AMG team mates of Giddy and Pedersen, with the former briefly taking the top spot before Pedersen reclaimed the lead a few corners later.

By lap 13, the Porsche 992 of Marco Giltrap began to find his straps and put a move on Giddy to slot into P2 and began to chase down race leader Pedersen who was 1.1 seconds up the road.

Giltrap began to close in on the AMG of Pedersen in the closing laps, but despite getting close to the Mercedes couldn’t close the gap through the tight and technical sections of the Hampton circuit.

Pedersen however managed to hold on cross the line ahead of Giltrap with Giddy third.

The GT New Championship have two more races tomorrow, a 30-minute and a 1-hour feature.